The Cheat
by MrsTater
Summary: Vulcans do not indulge in what humans term "what-if" scenarios, but Spock is only half-Vulcan, and the aftermath of battle reminds him of how much more he could have lost.


_A/N: A little late to the party, but still in the spirit of Memorial Day. Thanks to **Jncar** for beta-reading and especially helping with the details of starship crew numbers! Feedback welcome and much appreciated.

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**The Cheat**

_A captain cannot cheat death_.

The words spoken to James Kirk play in a loop in Spock's mind as his eyes follow the scrolling names projected on either side of the convocation hall. There are 6,823 names, representing the 6,823 Starfleet officers and cadets who perished in the Battle of Vulcan.

Spock knows without reading the text beside the names upon which starship each served; he made the assignments himself. Tripp, Audrey - Medical, _USS Truman_...Trucco, Marc - Sciences, _USS Farragut_...Tyson, Kara - Engineering, _USS Antares_...

His gaze flicks from the projection screen to the rows of red uniformed cadets seated before and around him. There should be more. Nearly 7,000 more. The convocation hall is barely three-quarters full, where only a week ago Starfleet Academy enrollment was full to capacity.

Across the aisle, five rows up from him, twelve seats down, his gaze locks on familiar black hair hanging down a female cadet's back, equidistant between her shoulders. Lieutenant Uhura's bearing is correct, unlike many of her peers who bow their heads or even hunch in their seats, shoulders sometimes giving an occasional tremor -- though Spock suspects that if he could see her eyes, they would reveal the emotion her posture does not, dark as fathomless space and heavy with tears that glitter like the stars for which she is named. That is what they made him think of when she came to him in the turbolift after the destruction of Vulcan. No doubt with all that has transpired in the days since then, this memorial service marks her first opportunity to consider and mourn _her _loss. Colleagues. Classmates. _Friends_. 6,823 added to the six billion Vulcans massacred by the Romulan Nero.

_A captain cannot cheat death_.

Spock, of all people, knows this. Uhura, the cadets, the names recede as the images in his mind rise up to create a more vivid scene than the reality of the memorial service. Ancient mountains of stone quaking around him. His mother turning, reaching, his own fingers straining out for her, then...

..._gone_.

As acting captain of the _Enterprise_, Spock responded to a real-life situation not unlike his _Kobayashi Maru_ simulation, in precisely the manner in which he had lectured Kirk: by doing what he could. Beaming down to Vulcan to rescue the High Council had been the only logical course of action, and it _had _preserved Vulcan history and culture.

Why, then, has a query made sleep elude him each successive night since? If his parents -- if his _mother_ -- had not been with the Council at the Katric Ark, what choice would he then have made? Who would he have saved? He cannot deny that being motherless leaves him more bereft than being homeless, one of the last of a dwindling race. If faced with such a decision, would he have found himself capable of setting aside the bonds of family in order to preserve a culture?

And then, just as he envisions himself on the bridge of the _Enterprise_, fingers clamped around Kirk's throat, pinning him to the control panel, the _real _Kirk's eyes catch his from across the aisle. Piercing blue jars him to awareness of his own illogical thought process.

Spock sits up in his seat, straightens his shoulders, fixes his eyes on the projections at the front of the hall. What is done is done; Vulcans do not indulge in what humans term "what-if" scenarios. The probability of Sarek and Amanda having been anywhere but the Katric Ark at the brink of cataclysm is so small as not to exist.

Nevertheless, Spock continues to ask himself, "What if?" What if he had caught hold of his mother's hand? What if she had survived and Sarek died? What if Spock had been forced to choose between them?

What if fate had chosen for him, like a program adapting to counteract a cheat?

And what if...he had not transferred Nyota from the doomed _Farragut _to the _Enterprise_?

If that had happened, he would now be reading 'Udinsky, Jan - Medical_, USS Antares..._Uffman, Michael, - Engineering_, USS Centaurus_...Uhura, Nyota - Communications, _USS Farragut... _

But Lieutenant Uhura is _not _the 6,824th casualty of the Battle of Vulcan. For the remainder of the memorial, Spock's eyes do not leave her.

Afterward, he exits swiftly through the nearest set of double doors at the rear of the hall, making his way to the courtyard, where he waits by the Japanese boxwood surrounding a modern sculpture until she emerges, blinking, into the sunlight. Spock raises one hand in a silent hail, and at once, as though looking for him, she sees him. The click of her resolute strides reaches his ears above the murmurs of the subdued crowd. As she nears, he observes that she has been weeping, the whites of her eyes nearly fully pink, the delicate skin beneath them swollen, her eyeliner smudged, dried tears evident in the broad daylight on cheeks the color of milky tea.

He thinks of that moment on the turbolift, when she had kissed his face, wrapped her arms around his shoulders, enfolding him tightly against her, inquiring what he needed. He wonders if she needs more than what he can give her in this moment, in public, he her superior officer and, more than that, a Vulcan. He clasps his hands behind his back.

"Commander," she says.

"Lieutenant." He pauses, for a heartbeat. "I know that you have many friends in the Academy who number among the casualties." The Academy Chorale Ensemble, of which she is vice president, is reduced by forty-eight percent. "I offer you my deepest condolences for your loss. And to them, I offer my gratitude for the sacrifice they made for the people of my home world."

He expects her to utter a quiet 'thank you', because that is what he has observed humans to say in response to condolences. But she acts unpredictably, as she often does, knitting her eyebrows together as if she is thinking that _he _is the unpredictable one.

"They did their duty, sir."

Yes, that would have been the more Vulcan response to tragedy, as opposed to the more human one he offered her. Spock is no longer certain which he is anymore, a 'child of two worlds'. Now that he is off the bridge of the _Enterprise, _it seems prudent that he not allow his humanity to die with Amanda Grayson, and so keep her alive in him just as Vulcan lives on in the surviving members of the High Council.

His eyes sweep Uhura...Nyota. Human. Alive.

_A captain cannot cheat death._

He steps nearer to her, unclasps his hands, allowing them to hang at his sides.

"If I had not re-assigned you from the _Farragut_, Starfleet would have lost its most promising xenolinguist and most capable communications officer."

The words are logical, unfelt, and not at all what he means, but Nyota's face shifts subtly, the lines of strain and troubled emotion relaxing a degree.

"I have thought of it, sir. I feel blessed that fate intervened, for my sake as well as Earth's." Fresh tears spring into her eyes, and she ducks her head. She does not need to say she is only sorry that fate did not intervene soon enough for Vulcan's sake.

Spock lifts his hand. After a moment of hesitation, he lays it on her shoulder. She looks up, meets his eyes.

"I think, Lieutenant Uhura, that it is less a case of fate intervening for you than you intervening in fate."

The corners of her mouth curve upward, and the shine in her eyes is no longer that of sorrow. "You were the one who played favorites."

He releases her shoulder, tugs at the hem of his jacket. "Yes, I do believe that my decision to transfer you to the _Enterprise_ was by no means an unbiased one. Nor an unselfish one. Nyota..." If he had justified his act of favoritism with logic, he cannot remember it now, as he moves close enough to her that she will not miss it when he says, very quietly, "If I had not transferred you to the _Enterprise_, I most certainly would have lost you."

Her chest heaves beneath her crimson uniform. "I'm glad you didn't."

_A captain cannot cheat death_.

It seems to Spock that he has, in fact, been wrong. Less easy to admit is that James Kirk may well be right not to believe in no-win situations.

An act of favoritism -- of impulse, of _emotion_ -- has turned into one small victory over death.

Shoulders erect and head held high, his stride once again sure of his direction, he walks Nyota home.

_The End_


End file.
